Sorry, Not Sorry
by Kat Henshaw
Summary: Darcy gets a little revenge on her ex.
1. Chapter 1

Darcy stared at the wall of the lab as she processed what Jane had said.

"Pepper said that Steve and the other Avengers are going to be at the Maria Stark Charity Masquerade Ball."

Jane had tried to break it gently, she was there when the Righteous Do-Gooder decided to break things off with Darcy with the good old fashioned dose of 'it's not you it's me,' a little 'I'm just not looking for anything right now' and a small amount of, 'I just think that I'm meant elsewhere.' Which would have been a fine and dandy let down after a date or two, but after eight months of serious dating, it was like whiplash and felt like a load of bullshit.

Only a few weeks later, after he'd packed his shit up and moved from New York to DC, it came through the spy-vine (read: avenger gossip queens) that he was doing the do with one Agent Sharon Carter. As in his ex's grand niece. It squicked Jane and Darcy out, but also they finally knew what he meant by 'elsewhere.'

That was three years ago. Since then there was the fall of SHIELDRA, the convergence and evil space elves in London, and the brief issue with the Accords (that got canned almost as fast as it tore the Avengers apart). Shortly after that Darcy, along with Jane and Thor, had moved in with Tony and his small collection of Avengers. The abroad division of the Avengers gang were expected to consolidate under the one, new and improved mega structure of overcompensating proportions (we see you Tony) and everyone is expected to play nice. That wasn't meant to happen for another five months. It seems things got moved forward, because the Masquerade Ball was next month.

Darcy flicked her eyes over to Jane, who was watching her carefully, worry etched on her face. The silence in the room at large indicated that the other person present was trying to be subtle in his concern, but failing miserably. This was a topic that really made him angry. She needed a distraction and this gave her an idea.

A coy smile curled on Darcy's face, mischief alight in her eyes. "Hey Jane, wanna go shopping on Daddy's credit card?"

A startled squawk form the other side of the lab, followed by the sound of swearing, caused the two women to snicker.

"I'm not your father! We ran tests! You were there Fun-size!" Tony's complaint was ignored entirely by the two women as they packed up their desks. The connection between Darcy and Tony was almost instant, and they fit into each other's lives and personalities with such ease that others (Peter Awkward Parker) had questioned if she were his illegitimate daughter.

"Seriously, I'll call Pepper and she'll file a lawsuit if you keep claiming to be my daughter." Darcy perked up at his weak threat. They both knew Pepper loved Darcy, because of her ability to keep Tony from destroying things, even managed to get him to look after himself. "Do you think she'll let me call her Mom?"

Tony's only response was to scowl and hand over his card.

"I promise to bring you back those bagels you like, Dad." Darcy offered as consolation, rubbing her hand up and down his arm while pocketing his black Amex. He let so few people have any physical contact with him; since he let her in, she tried to make up for it so he didn't become crazy(er) from being too touch starved.

Placing his hand over his heart, Tony gasped. "That's it, I'm adopting you. You're such a good daughter. I'll make sure the lawyers put a rush on the paperwork."

When the DNA tests came back negative and both their response was to put on a good face and both privately get hammered, Pepper had sat them both down, hangovers and all and suggested to them both an adult adoption.

Rolling her eyes, Darcy walked off, throwing over her shoulder, "The paperwork went through officially 16 months ago, Dad. If you recall, we went through Grandpa Howard's good whisky."

She felt her face stretch into a contented smirk at Tony's loudly proclaimed, "That's my girl!"

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	2. Chapter 2

Darcy adjusted the gold alloy cuffs on her wrists. She then readjusted the matching waist belt that perched perfectly at her natural waist, emphasising her hourglass figure. Making sure not to leave any fingerprints on the mirror-like metal, she then smoothed out the velvet off the shoulder mermaid dress tailor made for her in Ironman red; a gift from Pepper for this very occasion.

She hadn't had the chance to put on her gold mask, yet, because this was the night that Tony was going to announce his adoption of her and rather than mess up her makeup before his speech, she simply stood backstage mask less as the people involved did their speech thing before the festivities began.

He had put off the announcement, making Darcy worry about why. When she confronted him, he had explained that it was because he didn't want her to have to deal with the press without being given the choice and being prepped for the demand of being a Stark Heiress and all that it would mean. Her only response was, 'I'm not an heiress; I'm your daughter. You don't have to leave me a cent or anything, and I'll still be your daughter.'

There was an awful lot of pretending that neither was actually crying during that conversation, but it worked for them.

Through the curtain she could see that the whole Avengers gang was in attendance, at the large round tables that were spaced around the room, along with all the press and an obnoxiously large list of celebrities and rich people.

Though she wasn't nervous, she didn't want to embarrass her dad on the first showing. Even if he had already said that there was nothing she could do that was worse than he's already done himself.

She leaned against Pepper as they listened to Tony work the crowd, talking about the reunion and how the whole team was back together Captain America and all, even talked about how he looked forward to meeting the Winter Soldier properly.

Darcy and Pepper exchanged a concerned look at the subtle derision in his voice. They knew he'd worked out the issue with the Winter Solder with a very good therapist, he had said himself that he wanted to apologise for his, as he put it, 'slight overreaction.' And Tony had spoken his name with almost care, but the good Captain was another story. Whether it was his treatment of Darcy or his lying about Tony's parents, he was culpable and Tony was not having any of that tonight.

"Now, as you all know, I've never previously settled and had any little Starklings to call my own. But in true me fashion, I decided to do things completely different. See, there's a young woman." The room erupted into whispered chatter, causing Pepper and Darcy to roll their eyes. "And no, I don't mean a love interest, I mean, someone who has become so like my own flesh and blood that even others had questioned our relation to each other. We ran DNA, we all know I've got a history, and it came back negative to our mutual disappointment." The room was silent. "So I decided to adopt her. Everyone, my daughter and heir: Darcy Stark."

Shaking her head in fond exasperation, Darcy made her way to stand next to Tony. The wall of silence was deafening, but it was broken by the half of the Avengers that had seen everything unfold, then the rest of the room followed with applause.

Darcy stood with Tony, their arms around each other, smiling for the photos and answering questions. Thankfully they were saved by Pepper, who redirected the press to the annual Stark Industries contribution to the Maria Stark Fund, while Tony walked her to their table.

Pepper, being the absolute boss bitch of the world, had managed to put Jane and her between Tony and Thor and their backs to Steve Rogers, but not to any other of the Avengers. This meant she could totally check out the Avengers she hadn't had a chance to meet yet; such as the Winter Soldier, Falcon and the King of Wakanda; all in Tuxedoes. Hello eye-candy. Pepper is so getting a Worlds Greatest Mom mug for this.

During dinner, she knew she was getting some attention, but she was too focused on arguing with Tony; he thought it was a good idea to buy her a pimped out classic Cadillac or maybe a pimped out Audi, she thought that having a car at all was stupid since they were in New York and didn't go anywhere without Happy.

After dinner, Tony being the obnoxious show off that he is, took Darcy out onto the dance floor and danced like a loon, which ended with Darcy in a fit of giggles begging for Pepper to take over.

Darcy went back to their table, snagging a couple of champagne flutes along the way. She slumped ungracefully next to Rhodey, ignoring the people around them in order to give him the best puppy eyes she could muster.

Rhodey took one look and said, "No. Whatever it is, no. Tony gives me that look when he's trying to get me to do something stupid, and then I get in trouble from Pepper. No."

"But I just wanna dance with you, Uncle Rhodey." She pouted.

Rhodey rolled his eyes. "Tch, I already told you that I still haven't gotten these legs working well enough to dance when you begged me to join you and Thor in your spontaneous dance party in the communal kitchen this morning. No."

Before Darcy could respond, Steve Rogers' voice cut into the conversation.

"I'd be happy to dance with you, Darcy."

Rhodey tensed as Darcy switched her focus onto the man with a shitty plan. She took in the fact that the whole table was listening. She had known he had watched her the whole evening and that made this whole thing that much better.

Smiling impishly, she leant her elbow on the table, giving him a fantastic look at her cleavage. She got a thrill when his eyes bounced there and a wash of pink coloured his face and neck.

"Oh Stevie, we've already danced," she wagged her eyebrows leaving no room for confusion regarding her innuendo. "And you were so bad. I mean, you're pretty and all, but it never translated to the..." she paused. "Ballroom. If you know what I mean."

His stunned face was matched by all the others at the table.

Darcy smiled serenely, adding conversationally, "By the way, how's Agent Carter?"

His guilt was telegraphed across not only his face, but his whole body. The Winter Soldier and the Falcon both shot frowns at their captain, along with a handful of others at the table. The rest were trying their best to hide their smirks.

"Also, I may or may not have heard something about you in DC and had a little look into Agent Carters reports. Tch Tch Tch, Steve Rogers, the Captain America, I thought you'd have more class than making out with your neighbour while your girlfriend is on the other side of the world still cleaning up after an alien attack." Steve went pale as the whole table stared at him in varying degrees of disappointment.

"Oh well, at least I know now what you meant by 'I need to focus on my career.'" She said, putting on her worst impression of Steve. Then she sat back and took a sip of her Champagne while watching the fall out. Rhodey turned a little towards her, trying to hide his smirk.

Sergeant Barnes was the first to respond to all of this news. "You hacked SHIELD to confirm Steve was cheating on you?"

Darcy gave him a good once over, causing the soldier to blush. This only made her smug smile more flirtatious. "Sorry, not sorry, Sarge." She shrugged.

"Oh! Did I miss the thing!" came Tony's voice from behind her, causing Rhodey and Darcy to snicker. "I did! I can't believe you! I was going to record it. 'Baby's first hero take-down.' I was going to frame it and everything." Tony slumped into the chair next to Darcy pouting.

Darcy rolled her eyes at him, "You do remember I tased Thor when I first met him right?"

"That was you?" someone asked at the table, but wasn't answered because Tony was already replying to Darcy.

"Yes, and I want to capture all your mile stones, for posterity of course, that's what good dads should do." Tony was nodding sombrely.

Darcy graced him with a warm smile, knowing he was trying so hard to be the opposite of his own father. "Then how about you just take a quick photo?"

Tony waved his hand. "Oh, no it's okay; I already have FRIDAY editing it the footage. You forget that you have that mask on?"

Darcy's hand reached up absently to the tricked out mask he had given her and snorted inelegantly. "Oh yeah."

"And on that note, Barnes, I was watching the feed and you've been looking at Darcy like you wanna dance with her..." the soldier and Darcy's eyes popped out and Tony blanched. "No, not like that, I meant real dancing." He began waving his hands toward the people dancing. "On the dance floor. With your clothes on. Ugh! I give up." Tony slumped forward and buried his face in his hands.

Darcy, Rhodey and the Falcon began snickering, setting the rest of the table off too.

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